


Memories That Bleed and Breathe

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-10
Updated: 2008-10-10
Packaged: 2019-01-19 22:50:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12419901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: A glimpse into the motivations and choices of Severus Snape.





	Memories That Bleed and Breathe

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

He had been aware, of course, that Lily’s son was out there somewhere. The fact that The Boy Who Lived was out there doing just that did not escape Severus Snape. 

 

It had simply never crossed his mind that by assuming the position of Potions Master at Hogwarts, he cemented the inevitably of his path crossing with Harry Potter’s own twisted one. The years had not passed him by without notice; he had simply failed to connect the stars, not understanding that _of course_ James and Lily’s son would attend Hogwarts.  

 

Even Dumbledore’s subtle warning did not adequately prepare him for that first sighting.  For a heartbreaking second, Quirrell’s moronic stuttering fading away beside him, when Harry entered the Great Hall for the first time, Severus Snape thought James Potter had been resurrected. His pulse accelerated rapidly as he was brought painfully back to the humiliating years of his Hogwarts education and in his mind he was a student all over again, scowling at the sight of Potter and his cronies, hunching his shoulders at the sound of their insults, racking his brain for ways to retaliate.  For several tense moments that he would hate himself for later, he was waiting for Lily to walk through those doors. In his mind, she was staring up at the ceiling with unrestrained wonder, her hair flowing gently around her shoulders, her beauty a brilliant beacon that beckoned unrelentingly from across the numerous tables between them. He had wanted to show her everything; that first day when they boarded the train had been only the beginning. 

 

Days later, when he looked into those green eyes for the first time in a decade, he was once again sucker-punched with memories. Harry Potter, looking up at him with Lily’s eyes, with much the same innocent, forgive the term, _Mudblood_ expressions of astonishment over everything new set in front of him, and he is so much the cloned image of James that it would have made Severus lean over and heave the contents of that morning’s buffet into Potter’s cauldron if only he didn’t practically glow with the essence of Lily, was a vessel of painful reminders and Severus was given a choice of fight or flight. As his eyes narrowed and his lips tightened into a sneer of disdain, he felt an urge to flex his muscles, to hold his wand threateningly high. 

 

“Ah, yes,” he said coolly, regarding the boy with a mixture of pure hatred and scorn, “Mr. Potter. Our…new…celebrity….”

 

At the same that he felt filled with such disgust and animosity, he felt strangely empty to the core, a rotting core threatening to decay. And somehow, the only remedy was to try and drag Harry Potter down mentally to as low a level as Severus had resided at while at Hogwarts. He asked questions directly to Harry that he knew the boy would not be capable of answering. He overlooked the shortcomings of the Slytherins and snatched points from the Gryffindors as lazily as if he were simply trying to prove he could. That first day in the Potions chambers, he left such a stunning impression that not a soul in the room could be ignorant of the utter revulsion he felt at the sight of James Potter’s son. It was too easy to convince himself that James was the one cringing in humiliation, that James was the one everyone was snickering at, that James was now the one found wanting. 

 

And yet. 

 

He could not stand idly by and watch Lily’s son die. When the Quidditch match took an ugly detour, he was muttering the counter-curse almost before he even truly knew what was happening. Later, he hated himself for realizing he simply could not have survived knowing Lily’s eyes had closed indefinitely once again. It is in that moment that he chose left at the fork, the path of keeping Harry Potter alive, because Lily would have asked him to do it if she could and he had never been quite able to deny her anything. 

 

It was difficult to both protect Harry and abuse him, but Severus managed. He followed the boy around, continued to berate him in class, and volunteered to referee the ensuing Quidditch matches in order to keep a closer eye on the boy. Various glimpses into the boy’s mind were both enlightening and discouraging. He could never quite find substantial support for his perspective on Harry, but he still refused to separate in his own thoughts Lily’s son from James’s son. They were two separate entities in his head; one was the progeny of the love of his life, the other the satanic spawn of his mortal enemy. Both seemed to have merged into one being placed here for the sole purpose of pushing him into insanity. 

 

When Harry Potter miraculously survived to see a second year at Hogwarts, Severus felt a slight weight leave his shoulders. Now, finally, he could hate James Potter’s memory guilt-free, a debt repaid. 

 

Catching Harry’s glance at the final feast of the year, he said goodbye to Lily’s eyes for the summer, free of torment for three months, free of a reckless boy who has no consideration for or knowledge of recent history, free of the notion that had things been different, _had Lily chosen him instead of James_ , this boy would not exist and Lily would still be breathing.

 

 

 

**My apologies. I don’t have my books here at school with me and I’m afraid the story lacks a little luster because of that. It’s been bugging me for a while now, though, so I needed to write it all out. I’m not finished with it, I don’t think, I can see this going up until Snape’s death, but I don’t know if I’m going to continue on and just expand this or have multiple chapters. Just wanted some feedback for now. (And don’t hate me….you know from all the other stuff that I write that I am totally on James’s side. I just kinda feel for Snape a little bit…..it’s not a crime! :) )**

**Thank you, always, for reading!**

**love, lark**  

 


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